4.30.2011

And another...

It's done! And I must say that I'm really happy with how it turned out.

I decided to go a little out of my comfort zone and quilt this one with a variety of colors. I'm generally bad at visualizing things, so I wasn't sure how this would turn out, but it's a relatively small quilt (32"x32"-ish) and I figured if it didn't turn out well, I could always give it to the dogs. The spoiled, spoiled dogs.

Funny story about the thread... I didn't have all the colors in the "Dual Duty" basic cotton/poly Coats stuff, but I didn't make the decision to quilt in colors instead of white until the end of the weekend. Other goes past a JoAnn Fabrics on his way to work on Mondays (and only Mondays), so I asked him to pick up the same kind of thread in yellow and orange. I wrote a note and sent him with the spool of red thread to identify which kind I wanted.

He brought home absolutely gorgeous thread, shiny and just the right shades, and it was Sulky rayon embroidery stuff, a zillion yards of it and quite a lot more expensive than the basic stuff I wanted. I opened the bag and said "Oooh! Oh." When I told him it wasn't the right kind, he said that the lady at the fabric store had helped him pick it out.

Grr, lady at the fabric store. I suspect that what happened was that he went and stood in front of the Sulky display and she came along and he mentioned needing yellow and orange thread (he swears he showed her the spool I'd sent) and then they spent forever picking out the right shades. But this means that the fabric store lady believed that my husband needed help identifying the colors yellow and orange. Now, occasionally my husband tells people he's colorblind just for fun (he's not colorblind), but he insists that he didn't this time, so I was kind of miffed that the lady sold him this expensive not-appropriate-for-quilting thread. Also, ironically, the only yellow and orange thread I did already have is tiny little spools of Sulky rayon.

Then, later that evening I went back in, and one JoAnn worker said to another that "the husband" got the wrong kind of thread, and I very politely didn't inform them that actually, they "helped" him figure out what yellow and orange are, while completely disregarding which brand and kind of thread I'd asked for.

Wow, thread story was long. ANYWAY, it turns out that Coats now makes a slightly different composition cotton/poly thread and it was kind of hard for me to find even knowing what I was looking for, so I probably would've had to go myself anyway. ETA: And I should make clear that I'm more amused than angry over this. Really, going to the fabric store myself isn't exactly a hardship.

Great story, Hansel. Moving on:

I really love it. I freehanded the straight-line quilting, which means that it's a bit wobbly and imperfect, although the puckering camouflages that a bit. Using colored thread on a white background really makes the quilting visible, as I probably should have realized.

For the back I went with Ash, a solid from Connecting Threads (that I ordered accidentally instead of the Gray that I need to finish Cartoon Pinball II and am therefore free to use in other ways) and scrapped the idea of a pieced backing because the other solids I had just weren't working together. I adore how the back looks with the gridded quilting and the puckering.

This was taken before the finished quilt was washed, and you really can see the difference. The binding is a darker gray from Kona.

This one's going to be hard to part with, but it's going up in the shop. If it sells, I'll use some of what it sells for to get another charm pack of bold fabrics and make another one.